Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

Congratulations to the 2015 MARC Champions (alliance #4):
- 3641 The Flying Toasters,
- 68 Truck Down Thunders,
- 226 Hammerheads,
- 302 the Dragons.

See team photo here: https://flic.kr/p/u1EigB
See you at IRI soon!

Team 226 Hammerheads

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

During the opening ceremonies on Friday, the Monroe director of career and technical education said they should have air conditioning next year.

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

We had a great time at MARC this year, and great job everyone who went! AC next year does sound nice... :D

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

Same here! Working with you guys was awesome and I hope to see you guys around at some of our other off season events! Congratulations to The Flying Toasters, Truck Town Thunder, Hammerheads, and The Dragons on winning!

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

On behalf of myself and Marjie - Thanks to all of our volunteers! Hope to get to work with you in the future :)

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

MARC was a blast, as always. Thanks to the Toasters for the invitation and to the Hammerheads and the Dragons for the support. Also, congratulations to the #1 alliance for the great finals. They were some of the best I've seen this year and you guys had us on the ropes.

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

A few of us Toasters were able to stay after and help pack up. We had a blast! It was so fun! I encourage everyone to volunteer as it is not only fun, but good people to spend time with, connections to be made, and lots of laughs at times. My sincere thanks to all the put in so many hours volunteering and thru their efforts make robotics so much fun. It truly is the hardest fun you will ever have.

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

I tried being driver for the first time in competition and it was a blast!

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

I recorded high speed of our alliance's third semifnal match can battle here. I noticed from the video that 1918's burglers only released after 548 and 503 were pretty far down.

Re: 2015 M.A.R.C. ROBOTICS COMPETITION
 

Thanks for posting this video - its much better than the one on my cell phone!

I don't know why we had a delayed start in this match. Maybe something in our software or a field control goblin. Besides starting sooner, it appears to me that your arms also deployed faster. I'm not sure why we got the RC, but I'll take it!

For me, the can wars were the highlight of this game, and we were so excited to finally get the chance to go up against 548 and others at MARC. Unfortunately, only one arm was operational at this point. Lexan can only take so many stress cycles, and after countless deployments during development and in competition, we broke both "wrists" and two release latches this weekend (the last one while setting up for this match).

Our canburglars changed/evolved a lot over the season, right up to and including changes at MARC. They were a great learning experience. The current arms (carbon fiber powered by pre-charged pneumatic cylinders via high-flow solenoid with arm flexure for added zest) for were installed for MSC. At MSC, we used shifter cylinders to release the arms, but they had a lot of delay. For championship, we replaced the shifter cylinders with electric solenoids. They were faster, but sometimes they stuck, so we had to design and build new release mechanisms (still using the solenoids) in the pits on Friday morning - a feat that will go down in NC Gears history.

Those worked really well and made for some good battles in the Newton playoffs. Our burglar arms have lexan "hands" at the tip. The hands are intended to cover the hole in the RC, and they also include the hook for pulling the can. The hands we used at the time would cover the hole when the arms came down, but as soon as we drive off and set the hook, they exposed part of the hole. In a qual match against 1983, we got into a tug of war. We beat them to the can, but their hook dropped into the hole as soon as we drove off. For playoffs, we increased the delay time by a couple of seconds and went up against 1983 again. This time, we beat them to the can, and our "hand" covered the hole while they drove off, giving us control. In the next match, we went up against 3015. Apparently, they knew what our delay was, and set theirs for even longer. When we drove off, their hook dropped in and we had another tug-of-war, which we lost. Our last match on Newton was against 3310, and our autonomous failed to execute. Bummer. I wanted to see the outcome of that matchup.

For MARC, we installed longer "hands" to allow us to drive off without exposing the hole. The added mass slowed us down a little bit, and maybe also contributed to the wrist failure. We had 3 can battles in the semi's (against 67, 226, and 548), and I don't think the longer hands ever came into play. Oh, well. That's robotics.

It was great playing with 503 (Thanks for picking us), 3604, and 280 in the playoffs. Our new drive team got some great experience! Congratulations to the winning alliance. Special thanks to all the volunteers who make MARC possible.